Rhetorical situations

Have you ever had a rhetorical question thrown at you? You know, the ones that go "Are you stupid?" You almost always can't win - no matter what you do. You could reply with "no" but then you really would be stupid for giving the question any amount of attention, and if you said, "yes" then you have admitted the obvious. The same goes with what I call rhetorical situations.

Recently, I was in a no win situation that just really made me ponder why people expect anything at all out of you. If you remain true to yourself, then you are mean spirited for being brutally honest. OR if you refrain from being who you are, then you feel terrible inside and like you have sold yourself (and your beliefs) out. What IS it that people expect? If they know anything about you at all - shouldn't they learn from personal history how things will turn out? I mean, really. I wouldn't normally consider myself a particularly hateful person (unless, of course provoked) but for giggles, let's take a closer look at the inner workings of my mind music.

My mind works like this: peace, harmony, and serenity (complete with pretty butterflies and green grass) UNTIL a heart string gets snagged. The snagging can come from a sad movie (usually dogs or horses are involved), or friends being wrongfully treated, or a family member is threatened in anyway. When these things happen on the outside, my heart triggers my mind and IT IS ON. I can turn on a dime. I can go from sweet and caring to instantly venomous and in search of the nearest jugular. I don't think this is unusually abnormal, do you? I think in these same kind of situations, we would all pretty much react the same way.

I am expressing all of this because I think it is important to reflect on recent incidents and somehow vindicate my own actions. If someone in my life thought I needed help - I would expect nothing short of the world coming to a stop and my problems being fixed immediately, or at least acknowledged as a major life altering event. I would not expect it from people who are merely acquaintances, or even people who think they know me. I mean the people I allow in my life by MY choice. I took this kind of action for someone and feel relatively good about it, except for it kind of turned into a rhetorical situation. I was either wrong for being me, or I was wrong for not being me.

I wonder if this is some kind of test put forth because those people who are under that umbrella in my life needed to be loved in the real way or if I am supposed to walk away thinking, "That was a good lesson for me to learn, Grasshopper. Thanks."

Seeing as how I am not accustomed to talking to tiny insects, I am just going to assume it is the first option. Either way - I will end this with that rhetorical situation. I seem to be good at those lately.